Jay Taft: Jimmy Clausen eyes backup Bears QB spot

BOURBONNAIS — If the last three years proved anything to the fairly new Chicago Bears’ brass, it was how important a backup quarterback can be to a team entangled in a playoff race.

Caleb Hanie may have cost the Bears a spot in the postseason in 2011, and Jason Campbell proved that he was inept at running the offense in just a couple of games in 2012. Then Josh McCown took over for an injured Jay Cutler midseason last year, and he produced three wins in his five starts, and some gaudy numbers. He threw 13 touchdown passes and just one interception with a passer rating of 109.8, and kept the team in the hunt.

While Cutler returned in Week 15, and the Bears eventually missed out on the playoffs by one game, McCown showed the Bears (and their fans) what a competent backup can do for you in times of need. McCown left for Tampa Bay in the offseason for a shot at a starting spot, leaving the Bears to search for the next efficient backup for Cutler.

“We’re not taking that position lightly at all,” the Bears second-year head coach Marc Trestman said over the summer. “It’s not like we didn’t know: the backup quarterback can be vital to your goals.”

So the Bears signed the former Carolina Panthers second-round pick and Notre Dame star Jimmy Clausen in early June, and they also drafted San Jose State’s David Fales in the sixth round. Those two entered training camp competing to unseat Jordan Palmer, who was on the team last year and was given the leg up on the No. 2 spot.

Palmer was with the Bears for most of the preseason in 2013 and then spent the final nine games of the regular season behind Cutler and Josh McCown.

Clausen, who looked good while working with the second-team offense on Monday — the second day of padded workouts for the team — is quietly making the backup QB decision tougher every day.

“I’m just trying to go out each and every day and work on my craft and try and help this team win games once the season comes around,” said Clausen, who had no turnovers and multiple big-play passes Monday. “But for myself, I still have a long way to go, learning the offense, and taking what I learned out onto the field each and every day.”

Clausen had surgery to repair a torn labrum this past offseason, but he said over the summer that this is the healthiest he’s been since his junior year in college. Still, the rough start to his pro career is hard to dodge.

After being drafted 12th overall by the Panthers in 2010, he played in 13 games during his rookie season, completing just 52.5 percent of his passes while tossing three touchdowns compared to nine interceptions. Soon after, Carolina drafted Cam Newton, and Clausen’s run as a starter for the Panthers was over.

Clausen doesn’t use that stretch of his career as motivation nowadays, though.

“No, whatever’s in the past is in the past,” he said. “This is where I am right now.”

And he made the most of his opportunities Monday. It was the first day he worked exclusively with the second-stringers, and he completed long passes to receivers Michael Spurlock, Chris Williams and Marquess Wilson.

Now he has to show he can move the offense on a consistent basis. Palmer will most likely get more shots with the No. 2s, probably today, and the competition is far from over.

“We’ll see. I say when that time comes that we have to make that decision, hopefully we’ve got all the information we need to make that decision,” quarterbacks coach Matt Cavanaugh said. “But I wouldn’t say that anybody’s got anything locked up.”

That’s what Clausen is hoping.

“I just hope I get enough chances,” he added, “and that I keep making the most of them.”